If there is one trend that seems to stand out above the rest this year, it is the real opportunity, if not the urgent need, to personalize marketing efforts. There are four incredibly potent reasons for this:
- It’s what your Customer wants. The socially connected — wizened if not hardened — and inundated customer wants it. Your customer does not like to be sold to, but loves to buy (when it’s right). {Tweet this!}
- Brands don’t talk, people do. When we talk personalization, we should also think personality. In line with the spot-on video,”The Break-Up,” that Microsoft so cleverly produced, brands need to personalize their communications and bring out their personality to engage with the customer. {Tweet this!}
- The intimacy of the smartphone requires it. I would firmly argue that the personal smartphone — always at hand’s reach — demands it. Especially when it concerns a geo-localized communication, an SMS or a message via social media channels, the opportunity to reach out to a potential or loyal customer via the mobile must be treated with great respect. {Tweet this!}
- Because you (and your competitors) can. The digital tools and platforms out there allow for it. Moreover, it can be done in methodical ways with defined metrics. To this point, it is not about being perfect in the way you communicate (that’s just not feasible, or human). It is about being better than your competition. {Tweet this!}
The more regular readers of this blog will know that my tagline is: Branding Gets Personal.
At the core, this tagline reflects 4 very important characteristics for strong and sustainable brands:
- for the employees to be the #1 most engaged fans of the brand
- for the brand to have personality (and, thus, allow imperfections)
- the need to create personal relationships with stakeholders and customers
- for leadership to embody and personify those values and behaviors.
Marketing and branding gets personal…
It seems increasingly obvious that brands, marketers and consultants are becoming more attuned to this need.
To this point, Econsultancy & Adobe published in November 2014 a survey showing how companies are tending to focus on the personalization of their online marketing. I think it’s worth noting that there are still 41% of companies that do not think that personalization is relevant to their online business. One can only wonder how many believe that personalization offline is relevant?
An article by Christopher Ratcliff, staff writer at Econsultancy, identified four reasons why marketing should get more personal:
- Better customer experiences
- Improved conversion rates
- Real-time personalization can improve sales even further
- Improve customer experiences without the creepiness
What is interesting about these four reasons is that two are focused on driving sales, while two are all about improving the customer experience per se.
Big data, privacy concerns, new digital platforms, old-fashioned mindsets and legacy systems are swirling around together to make a meal of the push for personalized marketing efforts. It will be in execution — where the personalization is authentic, relevant and better than the competition — that the winners will be sorted out from the losers. {Tweet this!}
For good further reading, I can suggest the report published by Econsultancy in association with Adobe: “Why Marketing Should Be Personal.”
Your thoughts and reactions are most welcome!
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